uo 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



lUNK 1. 1917. 



(letcrniined war spirit and its actual productive activities. 1 he 

 deadly, thorough earnestness, the utter carelessness of cost, is 

 remarkable. The output is staggering, literally prodigious. 

 Great Britain is one vast arsenal. Scarcely a village, town or 

 city possessing a workshop or *any half-way suitable machinery 

 is not working day and night to feed the insatiable mouth of 

 war. And all, under a deceptively superficially calm exterior. 

 The British have tackled the job as though it were to last for- 

 ever, and that is their temperament. The ingenuity and efficiency 

 of American machinery is everywhere in striking evidence. For 

 years prior to the war, there was conflict between capital and 

 labor. The one paying as little, the other doing as little as 

 possible. The war has given labor the upper hand. It is de- 

 cidedly the "top dog." As Minister of Munitions, Lloyd George 

 gave to the trades unions practically all they demanded, includ- 

 ing rates for work which may be increased, but cannot be re- 

 duced, and members of trades unions are reveling in such pros- 

 perity as they never expected. In many directions wages paid 

 now are as much in excess of actual value received as prior to 

 the war they were inadequate. 



Female labor has come into its own at a bound, women are doing 

 men's work and doing it well in every imaginable direction, in 

 workshops, on the farms, as postmen, railway workers, van 

 drivers, window cleaners, clerks— at almost everything, in fact. 

 I am not sufficiently conversant with industrial and political 

 economy to forecast the results after the war, but anyone with 

 half an eye can see that the suffragettes have won by sheer 

 merit, and that woman will never again be relegated to the 

 cramped industrial conditions of pre-war times. 



When Tommy exchanges his rifle and bayonet for the tools 

 of his proper trade, there will be trouble to tax statesmanship 

 before a modus z-izcndi is found, and the hide-bound conservatism 

 of British capital and the "ca-canny" silliness of British labor 

 will both have to yield to some sort of mutual understanding 

 more nearly approaching national common sense. 



I have seen Zeppelins plying their devilish trade and the after- 

 results, which were reported quite truthfully, ofiicially, as of "no 

 military importance," but the damage, aside from military im- 

 portance, was very real. I saw one brought down in two parts 

 in flames. It was a good display of fire works and produced 

 just about the same effect on the very unemotional crowd which 

 witnessed it. I do not think any more of them will visit the 

 British Isles. Their visits and their reception are rather too 

 costly. The English are an extremely patient, dogged people, 

 and after two years with them one is compelled to feel that they 

 possess the quality to win. They feel very grateful to the 

 United States, and I do not think they could have sent to the 

 people and to the government of this country a finer exponent 

 of themselves than Mr. Balfour. I have had the pleasure of 

 meeting him \Yhile I was working in Northeast Manchester, for 

 which constituency he was then member of Parliament. A ripe 

 scholar, a preeminent statesman, a sincere polished gentleman. 



My return crossing on the "St. Paul" was without incident, 

 except that there were aboard the survivors of officers and 

 crews of four American vessels that had been either torpedoed 

 or shelled in South .^merican waters, in the Mediterranean and 

 off the coast of Scotland. Their experiences had not perceptibly 

 affected their spirits, although some had spent 30 hours in open 

 boats. They are going to sea again as usual Some of them 

 perhaps once too often. Neither they nor the British sailors 

 I have met attempt to minimize the U-boat, but all feel that 

 invention will beat invention and very soon, and there are rather 

 more than official hints to that effect. 



the Allies in the Caucasus. After discussing the general con- 

 struction of the cars used, he describes the special tires. These 

 were band tires with cylindrical air chambers and were of special 

 breadth and thickness, which, besides permitting quick running, 

 prevented skidding in case of punctures. The tires also had the 

 added advantage, that they could stand overloading of the 

 trucks. 



CAPTAIN BUCKLETON TALKS. 



SPECIAL TIRES TOR MILITARY TRANSPORT. 



In a recent contribution to a German motor paper, an authority 

 on motor vehicles expresses his admiration of the transport 

 ors-anizatinns which contributed so much towards the success of 



pAPTAIN ERNEST E. BUCKLETON, known to the rubber 

 ^^ trade of two continents, at the urgent solicitation of the Red 

 Cross has been induced to talk of his experiences at the front. 



-\t a great and enthusiastic 

 niceting in Akron he said in part : 

 It was one of those "quiet days 

 on the western front" you read 

 ~(i much about in the dispatches. 

 I lutside of a continuous cannon- 

 ading, and uninterrupted rifle fir- 

 ing, interspersed with a few 

 trench bombs and minor trifles 

 if that sort, it was a beautifully 

 ptaceful end of a perfect day. 

 I hen something happened — it 

 u asn't until some time after that 

 1 discovered just what it was 

 that did happen. I do know 

 that the universe seemed to he 

 filled with an overwhelming, 

 crushing sound. Chaos describes 

 it as nearly as any mortal word. 

 I felt myself soaring aloft 

 ann'd a volcano of rocks and dirt 

 and things that had once been 

 men. Then I came down and a 

 Captain Ernest E. Buckleton. continent seemed to be shower- 

 ing on top of me. 

 I suppose they must have dug. me out. The next I knew I 

 was in a hospital bed with one of those angels of mercy caring 

 for me. There were deep dark rings about her eyes — ^I after- 

 ward found that she had hardly sat down in 48 hours — but there 

 was a smile on her lips and a cheery, bucking word for me. 

 And I must have been a pretty horrible looking specimen, too, 

 what with my heart and stomach all distended out of human 

 shape, and my face that rotten green from the poisoned gas 

 fumes. 



Bless those Red Cross nurses, with their brave hearts and 

 their souls too big for their bodies! In all the time I was in the 

 hospital I never heard a murmur of complaint. They were always 

 ready with a smile, a little joke, a cheery greeting, or some 

 tender ministration ; and this in spite of the fact that they were 

 working, many of thein. 24 hours a day, amid scenes of horror 

 that beggar description — laboring over men so frightfully muti- 

 lated that seasoned army surgeons turned sick. 



Your American Red Cross nurses and workers have done 

 wonders. Without them we would have had a tough bit of a 

 time getting along. Your American hospital in Paris is the most 

 efficient of all the war hospitals and your surgeons are marvels. 

 Not the least of the .\merican Red Cross work has been done in 

 the prison camps of the various countries. They have seen to 

 it that the prisoners got better food and better housing, and they 

 have practically eliminated those scourges of prison camps typhus, 

 typhoid, scurvy and cholera. Every soldier is looking forward 

 eagerly to the time when tens of thousands more of your plucky 

 American women will be wearing the familiar habit. 

 Boost for the Red Cross! Wouldn't you? 



Captain Buckleton was enthusiastic over the sending to France 

 of nine regiments of -\merican railroad engineers. He declared : 

 They will be of inestimable service. No one realizes how badly 

 we need more railroads to transport materials and food to the 

 front. It will be a fine thing for your new army, too, for these 

 men will have an opportunity to get hardened to the nerve-rack- 

 ing task of working under fire, and so be able to help train new 

 contingents as they arrive. 



The moral effect of the Stars and Stripes can't be overesti- 

 mated. I would like to be present if they decide to send a part 

 of the contingent through Paris. Talk about an ovation ! 



Copy of Index to "Rubber Machinery" will be sent free upon 

 request. 



